The NB extract kit I am breing right now calls for secondary fermentation, and normally I would do this no problem, but the recipe also calls for dry hopping with 8+ oz of hops. I have no desire to try and fish out a bunch of bags of hops from my glass carboy afterward, and I don't want to put the pellets in loose because I don't want to lose a gallon of beer out of my 5 gallon batch.

My question is, do I need to do a secondary, or can I just extend the time in the primary (Ale Pail) and add the hops to there?

Many of us who dry hop in a secondary just simply toss the hops in without a bag. The when it comes time to transfer, we rig up some kind of filter (often a mesh bag) on our racking cane to leave the hops behind. There is some danger of plugging the filter. With loose hops you can then rinse then out afterwards - it may take several rinses to get them all out

You can dry hop in the primary if you want. Or you can do it in secondary. There are subtle flavor differences between the two methods. Try it one way this time, and the other the next and see what you prefer. Be sure to keep in mind that as you gain experience, your beers will improve, so that will have an impact and potentially cloud conclusions about one method over the other

Yes, it will work. There is more chance the filter will plug though. The longer the filter is in contact with the hop bits, the faster it will plug up. I would suspend the end of the racking can in the middle of the beer where there are no hop bits and only lower it to the bottom as needed to keep the siphon going.